Mourners gather for Maggie Daley wake, visitation

Dan HinkelTribune reporter

As hymns sung by a small choir echoed off stone walls, former Mayor Richard M. Daley stood for hours in front of his wife's copper-colored casket to shake hands and accept kisses on the cheek from powerful acquaintances and ordinary strangers.

The wake for Maggie Daley, held under an ornate glass dome at the Chicago Cultural Center, a building she worked to restore, stayed true to the family tradition of interlacing private life, public prominence and politics.

One moment early in Sunday’s wake, Democratic Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin was rescued from the long line of private citizens by the former mayor's brother, White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley, who unhooked a velvet rope running down a packed staircase to lead him to a more privileged position.

Minutes later, the city's longest-serving mayor indulged an admirer's request for a photo near the closed casket and the portrait of his wife, silver-haired and beaming the toothy smile that was her public trademark before her death on Thanksgiving.

If it was unclear whether Maggie Daley was widely appreciated in her adopted city, the question was answered by crowds that queued in lines stretching more than a block around the light stone walls of the former Chicago Public Library. Contemporaries and old friends turned out in well-worn Sunday fashions and mingled with mourners in Bears gear.

Though she only “admired her from afar,” 74-year-old Hazel P. Holt drove downtown in her church finery from the Gresham neighborhood on the South Side, absorbed the cost of parking, rode the bus and then walked on a damp, chilly November day to the wake. Holt said Chicago’s former first lady built connections to the city’s people with her commitment to charities assisting children, as well as her public poise in the face of the cancer that would claim her life.

“I just loved this lady,” Holt said. “I wish I had one-quarter of her grace. She was a role model for a lot of us.”

While Maggie Daley was known more for championing social causes than engaging in the tough local politics synonymous with her last name, people in line could be heard working to identify local politicians and business leaders as they arrived to pay their respects. Durbin and current Mayor Rahm Emanuel pulled up shortly after the family, as more than a hundred lesser-known mourners lined the sidewalk behind metal barricades, awaiting entrance starting at noon.

The crowd was long on her peers, and they quietly exchanged stories of encounters with her – a ride on an elevator, a seat next to her at an event.

“She was that nice in college too,” said a woman who showed up late, announced herself as a friend from Maggie Daley’s university days and apologized as she pushed toward the front of the line.

Inside, the line wound around the edge of a spacious hall and out into a lobby embellished by gold designs, green mosaic tiles and high-minded quotes carved in stone. A small choir stood on a staircase and sang a capella hymns as the first guests arrived to sign computerized guest books housed in wooden kiosks before looking over the elaborate bouquets sent by prominent families along with local municipalities.

Mourners picked up cards printed with her picture, a prayer calling for public service and an oft-cited quote by the cultural anthropologist Margaret Mead: “Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed people can change the world; indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”

Inside the hall, the former mayor, with Millennium Park out the window behind his back, headed a reception line that also included the couple’s adult children, Elizabeth, Nora Daley Conroy and burly, bearded Patrick towering over his father.

The longtime mayor, in a black suit and tie, stood before a casket topped by great orbs of green and white hydrangeas. Daley, known in his mayoral years for the testy outbursts with which he greeted unwelcome questions from reporters, patiently greeted guest after guest.

Standing through public memorial ceremonies comes with being a Daley. An estimated 100,000 people passed the casket that held his father, Richard J. Daley, the longtime mayor and Democratic titan who died in 1976. The death of Richard M. Daley’s mother, Eleanor “Sis” Daley, in 2003 again drew crowds to the family’s ancestral turf in Chicago’s Bridgeport neighborhood.

On Sunday, the former mayor smiled as acquaintances shook his hand or kissed his cheek, and he solemnly accepted the condolences of legions of strangers.

“He’s in remarkably good spirits,” said Terry Tobin, a Chicago-based plumber’s union member who had met the mayor before.

But it wasn’t just Maggie Daley’s husband and family name that drew crowds, attendees said. Asked what would attract private citizens to a wake for a former city first lady, Tobin answered, “The building says it all.” He was referring to her work to improve the handsomely designed structure after it was spared from wrecking crews.

Other mourners were involved in After School Matters, a program that offers educational and career-building activities to local children. Many spoke of her commitment to improving conditions for the city’s kids.

C. A. Lofton, a retired teacher for the City Colleges of Chicago who lives in the Hyde Park neighborhood, said she attended the wake “to honor and pay tribute to the work (Maggie Daley) has done over the years with the youth, regardless of race and social class.”

“People are out here because they care,” Lofton said. “I haven't seen a line like this since (then-Mayor) Harold Washington died.”

While the politically connected arrived early to give quotes to waiting media, and others showed up to honor her work for the city’s children, still other mourners cited simple acts that showed her humanity.

Martin Brennan, 66, said he met Maggie Daley last spring outside a downtown restaurant. Sheepishly, Brennan asked Daley if she would sign an invitation to the 90th birthday party of his mother, a woman named “Margaret” who grew up on the South Side.

Daley gladly obliged, writing a touching note that she addressed to “another Margaret.” The autographed invitation, Brennan said, was his mother's favorite gift.